are all formed by cutting out of so many square
sections, recessed one within the other. This will be more fully
described in the next lecture. We are now speaking more especially of
the pier as affected by this method of building the arches in recessed
orders. If we consider the effect of bringing down on the top of a
square capital an arch composed of two rings of squared stones, the
lower one only half the width (say) of the upper one, it will be
apparent that on the square capital the arch stones would leave a
portion of the capital at each angle bare, and supporting nothing.[4]
This looks awkward and illogical, and accordingly the pier is modified
so as to suit the shape of the arch. Figs. 111, 112, 113, and 114,
with the plans, B C D, accompanying them, illustrate this development
of the pier. Fig. 111 is a simple cylindrical pier with a coarsely
formed capital, a kind of reminiscence of the Doric capital, with a
plain Romanesque arch starting from it. Fig. 112, shown in plan at B,
is the kind of form (varied in different examples) which the pier
assumed in Norman and early French work, when the arch had been
divided into two recessed orders. The double lines of the arch are
seen springing from the cap each way, in the elevation of the pier. If
we look at the plan of the pier, we see that, in place of the single
cylinder, it is now a square with four smaller half cylinders, one on
each face. Of these, those on the right and left of the plan support
the subarches of the arcade; the one on the lower side, which we will
suppose to be looking toward the nave, supports the shaft which
carries the nave vaulting, and which stands on the main capital with a
small base of its own, as seen in Fig. 112--a common feature in early
work; and the half column on the upper side of the plan supports the
vaulting rib of the aisle. In Fig. 113 and plan C, which represents a
pier of nearly a century later, we see that the pier is broken up by
perfectly detached shafts, each with its own capital, and each
carrying a group of arch mouldings, which latter have become more
elaborated. Fig. 114 and plan D show a late Gothic fourteenth century
pier, in which the separate shafts have been abandoned, or rather
absorbed into the body of the pier, and the pier is formed of a number
of moulded projections, with hollows giving deep shadows between them,
and the capitals of the various members run into one another, forming
a complete cap round the